Comments on: J M Coetzee’s Señor C on ‘national shame’ http://theleoafricanus.com/2008/02/07/senior-c-j-m-coetzee-on-national-shame/ Fri, 10 Feb 2012 13:43:07 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: Rustum http://theleoafricanus.com/2008/02/07/senior-c-j-m-coetzee-on-national-shame/#comment-24 Fri, 08 Feb 2008 11:42:48 +0000 http://leoafricanus.wordpress.com/?p=63#comment-24 Mmm, the old internal debate of which is one’s favourite Coetzee novel. I only discovered Coetzee in 1990, when he had already published Age of Iron. Michael K used to be my favourite too – just for that single-mindedness of the protagonist, despite the setbacks. I mean, his mother dies in Stellenbosch! A long way from her birthplace.

But now, still, the Master of Petersburg is my favourite and I feel, if one had to be introduced to his later period, that is the place to start, and not Disgrace, which is where I went off Coetzee. Not because of politics – the politics and the political in his novels have always been for those of steely hearts and stomachs. I went off Coetzee because Disgrace was too much like Coetzee, the lines so perfect and tense, as if they would snap any moment.

Master of Petersburg, though, is tender – a father ruminating about his possible failures as a parent; and clever for its ventriloquist attack on the SA critics of socialist realist bent.

I grew tired of Costello, but I’m interested in this latest. My bank manager indicates, however, that I must wait for the paperback edition.

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